This study systematically compared health indicators in the United States and England from childhood through old age (ages 0–80 years). Data were from the 1999–2006 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey for the United States ...and the 2003–2006 Health Survey for England ....
First, it should be noted that the data is somewhat different between the databases. In fact the Health Survey is done by the UK agency responsible for industrial health whereas the CDC does the US data.
Individuals in the United States have higher rates of most chronic diseases and markers of disease than their same-age counterparts in England. Differences at young ages are as large as those at older ages for most conditions, including
This is a comment on chronic disease markers and those mostly driven by childhood bad behavior.
obesity, low high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, high cholesterol ratio, high C-reactive protein, hypertension (for females), diabetes, asthma, heart attack or angina (for females), and stroke (for females).
Now this statement set the tale. It is primarily obesity and its sequellae. That is one of the telling elements of this paper. It does not focus on the major health care issues of cancers and other generally non life style disorders.
For males, heart attack or angina is higher in the United States only at younger ages, and hypertension is higher in England than in the United States at young ages. The patterns were similar when the sample was restricted to whites, the insured, nonobese, nonsmoking nondrinkers, and specific income categories and when stratified by normal weight, overweight, and obese weight categories.
The following sentence is the most critical in the Abstract.
The findings from this study indicate that US health disadvantages compared with England arise at early ages and that differences in the body weight distributions of the 2 countries do not play a clear role.
The following sentence is the most critical in the Abstract.
The findings from this study indicate that US health disadvantages compared with England arise at early ages and that differences in the body weight distributions of the 2 countries do not play a clear role.
There are several observations worth noting:
1. The UK does have a higher mortality rate for cancers than does the US. That may be due to poor later care from their wonderful health care system. Yet that statistic does not appear to have been included.
2. The statistics addressed were in many ways lifestyle in nature and not health care system related. Obesity is a life style characteristic, people just eat more. In the US high caloric intake from larger portions as well as higher caloric density food is much more common. Yet Europe is catching up. Take C reactive protein, it is a broad measure for inflammation, often due to obesity. Thus many of the metrics indicated are all sequella from obesity.
3. The conclusion that the health disadvantage starts at an early age is a natural conclusion of higher childhood obesity. Yet as noted the UK is catching up on that as well.
4. Any inference that this is due to a health care system difference is a clear non-sequitur.
Thus as one of the left leaning economists states:
If the US spends so much more on health care than the UK, why doesn't it produce better outcomes?
The authors of the study clearly state that the outcomes are childhood related and that is diet and not the health care system. In fact as we have argued for a long time this is the problem. Obesity. It is a choice issue and we then end up paying for that choice and its sequellae.
In my opinion this is classic economist logic, namely there is none. If all else fails one should read the words and look at the data. Namely for those things which our health care system works on, say cancer, the US is better, and for those which are personal choices, we are worse.
I have seen over and over again that economists tend to opine on health care matters when they know little if anything. They are truly reckless in many matters and this is dangerous sine people have been listening to them. It is a shame we have such poorly educated economists, then one just has to look at the economy!
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